New Tesla showroom opens in Meatpacking District

For the past year Tesla has been campaigning to change a New York law that keeps the electric-car company from opening more showrooms than the five it currently has in the state. A bill loosening those restrictions has yet to move forward in Albany, but the Palo Alto, Calif.–based company is making the most of its lone Manhattan location.

Starting Friday, any New Yorker looking to buy, test-drive or simply hang around the company's two luxury models—the Model S sedan and the Model X SUV—can step into an art gallery–like space at 860 Washington St., next to the High Line. The new showroom, facing The Standard hotel, takes up 10,900 square feet, or more than double the 4,300-square-foot space Tesla had operated until recently in Chelsea.

The fashionable location provides plenty of room for showing off Tesla's energy products, including a Powerwall battery for storing energy generated by the company's solar panels. The system lets a Tesla owner charge the car's battery overnight and is aimed at New Yorkers living in the suburbs or who own a second home in the Hamptons.

Photo

Matthew Flamm

The Tesla showroom in the Meatpacking District

Ordinary apartment dwellers could check the map that appears on a car's tabletlike dashboard screen showing locations of charging stations in garages across Manhattan. Two supercharging stations have recently opened in the city—one downtown, on Mott Street, and the other on West 75th Street. They can replenish most of an empty battery in about half an hour.

The company says nine supercharging stations are also on the way in the city. The showroom display does not include the Model 3, a midsize sedan with a price tag that starts at $35,000. The company has received more than 400,000 orders for the car, but its production has been plagued by delays.

Tesla has been blocked from expanding its retail footprint by a law that requires carmakers to sell their wares through franchised dealerships. A 2014 compromise allowed Tesla to hold on to the direct-to-consumer outlets it had already opened in New York.

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